Hello again people. I'm sure you all missed me, but tea reviews need tea to be reviewed, and i'v been running fairly short on unique teas to review. Well fret not on Friday I ended up at a restaurant in Yorkton Sk called "Touch of Asia" a buffet style Asian cuisine restaurant. I wont comment on the food because that is not the focus here. I do not usually order tea at restaurants because they usually will bring out some sort of tea dust in a sock (teabag). And so i did not, after eating I was going up to the counter and noticed that there was one of those "easy" gaiwans, sitting under a hot water dispenser. I was imensly shocked. So much so that I actually commented on it. "oh you use a gaiwan for tea here?" I said to the waitress, she gave me a clueless expression and then pointed to the water dispenser. "This?" she replied. I shook my head and she then pointed to a bamboo tea table. I shook my head again. She then picked up this small purple toy and asked if that was it. By then i was pointing to the gaiwan and said "no this is a gaiwan" she had a slightly surprised look on her face and said "you know the Chinese name for it yes gaiwan." She then took the lid off the Gaiwan and showed a full bowl of nice full leaf tea that looked like a Oolong. I then replied with "Yea I'm kind of a tea guy." She smiled and commented that she has gone to china to buy tea a few times and then digs around into the counter underneath the gaiwan and retrieves 3 packs of tea and hands me them. I look them over and noticed that there was no English on the package. I looked back to her and asked "Tie Kuan Yin?" she affirmed my suspicion slightly surprised i knew the name, even though it was a total guess on my part. She then asked which teas I liked, I told her my favorite Oolong was Bao-Zhong, which she had no clue of, perhaps I butchered the pronunciation? By that time i was making my friends impatient, and had to cut the conversation short. I thanked her for the tea and headed out, passing one of the packs to my friends mom. Whom I had recently introduced to the joys of quality loose tea.
quite the little story eh? And now on to the tea.
Prep: 7.5g in dayi gaiwan. @ 80c
1st Infusion: 2m Light nutty floral flavor nothing really pops but a nice meld of flavors.
2nd Infusion 1m: a vegital note has come into play with the nutty florals but is muted in comparison.
3rd Infusion 2m A smokey flavor has apeared and the vegital flavor has intensified slightly.
4th infusion 2m: Flavor has mellowed out again smokeyness is gone but the rest remains.
5th Infusion 3m Flavor is starting to drop off.
6th Infusion 5m At 80c 6 infusions is all you'll get out of it. 7 if you really pushed it.
Leaves: leaves were still slightly stiff.
Thoughts: Not the most amazing TKY i'v had but for something served in a restaurant its mind blowing. next time i go there i may just order the tea.
tea score 3/5 restaurant tea score 5/5
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